“You journalists,” I said, “are wonderful. You get into the front row every time without paying, whether it’s a coronation or a funeral. How did you manage it this time?”
“My brother Tim is connected with the show. I daresay you don’t remember him at Curraghbeg. He was fifteen years younger than me. My father married a second time, you know. Tim is my half-brother.”
I did not remember Gorman himself in Curraghbeg. I could not be expected to remember Tim who must have been still unborn when I left home to join the Army.
“Tim has the brains of our family,” said Gorman. “His mother was a very clever woman.”
I never heard Gorman say anything worse than that about his step-mother, and yet she certainly treated him very badly.
“You’re all clever,” I said. “Your father drove mine out of the country and deprived him of his property. It took ability to do that. You are a Member of Parliament and a brilliant journalist. Timothy—I hardly like to speak of him as Tim—owns a splendid circus.”
“He doesn’t own it,” said Gorman.
“Well, runs it,” I said. “I expect it takes more brains to run a circus than to own one.”
“He doesn’t exactly run it,” said Gorman. “In fact he only takes the money at the door. But he has brains. That’s why I want Ascher to meet him. I didn’t ask Mrs. Ascher,” he added thoughtfully, “though she hinted for an invitation, rather made a set at me, in fact.”
“Give her my ticket,” I said. “I don’t mind a bit. I’ll buy another for myself in a cheap part of the house, and join you at supper afterwards. You ought not to disappoint Mrs. Ascher.”